wind

GE supplies wind turbines for Indian 200 MW digital wind farm

GE Renewable Energy has announced the completion of construction of the first of a three-phase wind project in southeast India, namely Mytrah Energy Limited’s Aspari I wind farm.

The first 51 MW of a planned 200 MW project, consisting of 30 units of GE’s 1.7-103 technology, is now in place and ready for commissioning. The full scope of the project, located in the Kurnool district of Andhra Pradesh, is expected to consist of 52 units of GE’s new 2.3-116 technology, plus 47 units of its 1.7-103 machine.

The site will also utilize GE’s new Energy Forecasting application, part of its Digital Wind Farm ecosystem, first launched in May 2015. This consists of a dynamic, connected and adaptable wind energy ecosystem that pairs wind turbines with digital infrastructure, boosting a wind farm’s energy production by up to 20 percent.

The Digital Wind Farm system uses interconnected digital technology, often referred to as the ‘Industrial Internet’, to address a long-standing need for greater flexibility in renewable power and thus helping to integrate renewable technologies into the existing power grid more effectively. Sensors are embedded into the turbines and once they are connected, data gathered from them is analysed in real time using GE’s Predix software. This allows operators to monitor performance from data across turbines, farms or even entire industry fleets. The data provides information on temperature, turbine misalignments or vibrations that can affect performance.

As more data is collected, the system actually learns over time, becoming more predictive, “future-proofing” wind farms by maintaining top performance and avoiding the maintenance issues that typically occur as turbines age. It also reduces costs by customising maintenance schedules to ensure preventive maintenance is done only when needed.

“Our collaboration with GE is helping us drive higher production and more value by incorporating the latest digital technologies into our wind operations” said Ravi Kailas, Founder & Chairman of Mytrah Energy Ltd. “Projects like the Aspari wind farm will be important contributors toward helping India reach its national goal of achieving 175 GW of renewable energy capacity by 2022.”

Anne McEntee, President & CEO of GE’s Onshore Wind business, added that GE is proud to support the expansion of wind power in India and that the Aspari project is a good example of the added value that comes from combining multiple hardware and software technologies to better match specific conditions across a large site.

India’s national wind energy target is part of a broader pledge to achieve 40 percent non-fossil fuel generation capacity by 2030. The Aspari project will also support the state government’s commitment to add 9 GW of additional renewable power capacity across Andhra Pradesh over the next five years.

The full project installation will occur in three phases over the coming months.